


Dune: Paul’s Women, Chapter 13

by Wodric



Series: Dune: Paul’s Women [8]
Category: Dune (1984), Dune - All Media Types, Dune Series - Frank Herbert, Frank Herbert's Dune (2000)
Genre: Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Female Relationships, Lesbian Sex, Oral Sex, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-05
Updated: 2016-08-05
Packaged: 2018-07-29 14:19:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7687789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wodric/pseuds/Wodric
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chapter’s summary:</p><p>Jessica and the attractive Shadout Mapes begin a relationship.<br/>Thufir and the Duke Leto make some plans.</p><p> </p><p>See chapter 10: http://archiveofourown.org/works/7652146<br/>See chapter 14: http://archiveofourown.org/works/10760532</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dune: Paul’s Women, Chapter 13

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't do any changes to the Chapters 11 and 12 from the original book.

Paul’s Women

Book One: DUNE

Chapter 13

 

On that first day when Muad’Dib rode through the streets of Arrakeen with his family, some of the people along the way recalled the legends and the prophecy and they ventured to shout: "Mahdi!" But their shout was more a question than a statement, for as yet they could only hope he was the one foretold as the Lisan al-Gaib, the Voice from the Outer World. Their attention was focused, too, on the mother, because they had heard she was a Bene Gesserit and it was obvious to them that she was like the other Lisan al-Gaib.

\- from "Manual of Muad’Dib" by the Princess Irulan

 

Even inside the palace the air was dry. And there was always a smell in the air. A smell of spice and desert sands. Jessica’s quarters were immersed in the gloom. The shades seemed to refresh the air.

That afternoon Jessica retired early to her quarters. The baggages were all unloaded and the palace already had an organized look. The chaos of the first days was becoming a tired memory.

The pressure of all the change was beginning to affect Jessica. She was tired. She was exhausted, both physically and mentally. The attempt against Paul’s life. All the Harkonnen treasons. The knowledge of the existence of a traitor… all led to a continuous feel of insecurity and a draining permanent state of alert.

Leto was away with Paul, so Jessica knew that she would have all the evening to herself. She missed Alia and her laugh. But she was glad that her daughter was still safe in Caladan.

Slowly she undressed herself. She took of her shoes, let her dress fall on the floor before picking it up to hung it on the huge closet, next to her bedroom. She folded some more clothes and packed them.

When she was a student in the Bene Gesserit school at Wallach IX, she was used to work on these tasks with the other sisters. They helped each others to undress, to hung the dresses, to prepare for the night sleep, brushing each others hair, and sometimes even singing a sweet lullaby song or telling an old fairy tail, before going to sleep.

She had a brief moment of happiness, smiling to her long gone childhood.

In the middle of the nigh it wasn’t unusual that a sister student would escape from her bed to slip under another sister sheets’ and provide one to another the warm of a soft young skin, the comfort of a kiss, the tenderness of a hug, the intimacy of a shared discovered pleasure.

Those moments created bonds between the young girls. Those affectionate instants were a poor substitute for the lack of the caring love of a parent. Under the sheets, they just forgot that they didn’t know their lineage. Because even if her mother was among the older sisters there was no way to know. There was not way that a mother knew their daughter or that the daughter knew their mother. That secret was reserved to a restriced number of Reverend Mothers.

For a moment Jessica look to the huge mirror on her room and saw her figure. She removed her underwear and begun to brush her ginger hair standing up in front of the reflecting glass. She was no longer the skinny girl exploring her sexuality under the sheets of a secretly shared bed in Wallach IX. Also, she was no longer the pubescent girl that was much later officially introduced to the arts of lovemaking by her older and experienced sister. Some girls didn’t like their teachers.

On the contrary, Jessica found her lessons with the older sister Gaius Helen Mohiam enriching. The Gaius Helen was much younger back them. She wasn’t Reverend Mother yet. But there were some hints that she would become the emperor’s mistress. She was one of the most beautiful teachers that Jessica knew. When she was standing naked near the bed her natural long blond hair covered her nipples in sensual way. Her breasts were full of heat, blood and passion. Her belly was tasteful and an invitation to kiss her, to lick her further down.

Her classes were not so naive as those secret discovery moments under the sheets with Jessica’s roommates. Gaius Helen was already an experienced woman that already had been in contact with men. She already had seduced men and had put in practice all the Bene Gesserit millenary knowledge. She was an expert lover that teached Jessica the art of lovemaking. They explored to the limit the erogenous zones of a human body. Gaius Helen acted like a man and then like a woman. Then they changed roles and changed again covering all the possibilities that Jessica could face in her life. But more than that, Gaius Helen was a lover: A warm, kind and tender woman with the skills and the body of a love goodness.

In the end Jessica had a crush on her teacher while other girls simply had despised their own.

Even with all her training Jessica remembered the first time that she was with Leto. All the training didn’t teach her that it would be really different with a man. The smell was different. He had much more hair… and that virile member was expected but also surprising. She knew that she wasn’t the first woman for him. She was even sure that she wasn’t the first Bene Gesserit in the Duke’s bed.

There was a subtle knock on the door, which brought Jessica back to the present. She recognized immediately the sound as from the housekeeper Shadout Mapes. Even if she was still naked in front of the mirror, she didn’t hesitate.

“Come in”.

The door opened and Shadout Mapes entered the inner room with a tray of food in her hands.

“My lady…” her eyes dropped to the floor when she saw that Jessica was nude. She stood still, in silence.

“What is it Mapes?” Jessica’s voice was tired.

“You should rest and… eat… I brought you dinner.”

“It is difficult to rest when I know that is a traitor among us.”

“I can stay here for the nigh. I can sleep in the floor, on the bottom of the bed. Nobody will enter this room without your consent.”

Jessica smiled. She was sure that Shadout Mapes would give her life to protect the One. And it would be a wise decision to allow her to stay. Jessica could close her eyes and take some sleep for some hours with some degree of safety.

“You can place the tray of food there, in that small table. I am not hungry now…” Jessica followed Mapes while she obeyed, “and you can sleep here. I will be safer with your presence.”

“My lady, do you want me to brush your hair?”

Jessica didn’t answer. She just handed her the brush. Mapes moved forward, took the brush from Jessica’s hands and positioned itself behind her lady.

“My lady, could you sit down in the bench?” she said while with their hands on Jessica’s naked shoulders. Although Mapes seemed a strong woman, she touched Jessica with the delicacy needed to handle a fragile doll and for the following minutes Jessica allowed herself to relax and enjoy being brushed by Mapes.

She closed her eyes and she maintained them close for some time. Then she took one of Mapes’ gentle hands, held it for a while, and then she placed it over her breasts. Her nipples hardened. The brush felt on the floor but nobody seem to notice. Mapes began caressing her. Jessica felt Mapes’ hands running delicately over her shoulders and her chest. In a slow movement, Mapes turned her gently on her side so that she could lie down and place her head over Jessica’s round full breast and suck it. For this time Jessica wanted to be the object of all the caresses. She wasn’t interested in giving pleasure, she wanted just to be in a languid torpor and let her body be loved and admired without limits, without any restrictions.

Without noticing how Jessica found herself laid down in the large bed with her erect nipples pointed to the ceiling. Mapes was over her, with an hungry mouth devouring Jessica’s breasts, first one than the other, engulfing the distended nipple and a small part of the soft tit.

Mapes felt the roundness of the ass, the firmness of her turgid breasts, the warm softness of the belly, that particularly delicate skin between the legs, and she continued to caress continuously Jessica as she felt her lady melting under her lips and fingers.

When their lips met the kiss was long, wet and even feral. The tongues fought one against the other like swords. There was no blood in that fight. Just saliva. There were no losers, just winners. Jessica body knew that Mapes was an experienced woman. She was not an hungry teenager like Paul. Her hunger was savage but controlled. Her movements precise until the edge. She knew how to give pleasure to a woman’s body. She knew how to touch. When to make the right pressure.

Mapes left her for a moment just to let her bag dress fall on the floor, right next to the forgotten brush. She was slim, like most of the fremen, but her slimness didn’t impede her to have feminine curves, with magnificent breasts that could fill a hand and a round firm ass checks that would make envy to many noble born woman.

Jessica moaned a complaint until Mapes climbed naked into bed. Crawling like a predator, supporting her weight with her knees and hands. Her ass lifted up. Her head bent down. Her lips kissing Jessica’s feet and rising slowly by her long legs. All the way up until their mouths meet again in another long kiss. Mapes breasts bouncing forward in exquisite movements. Her hips swaying full of sensuality. Lowering her voluptuous breasts to brush softly Jessica’s smooth legs, soaked sex, firm abdomen, crushing them against her lady’s twins, breasts pressed against breasts, and raisin up again to brush those splendid breasts against Jessica’s upper chest, neck, chin and finally above Jessica’s mouth, allowing them to be kissed, sucked and devoured by hungry lips.

All the way up, Mape’s kisses and licks were infinite, leaving behind a goose bumps trail in Jessica’s skin. At the same time the fremen woman’s hands were all over her lover’s body. Taunting her. Cupping her breasts. Squeezing them. Traveling down when her body went up. Cupping her sex. Pressing gently with her fingers.

Jessica body shivered. She opened her mouth but the sound didn’t came out when Mapes ring finger and index finger touched her lips while her middle finger slid through the already heavily lubricated love channel. Mapes smashed her lips and tongue against Jessica’s mouth almost making it impossible to breath.

Jessica’s hips jerked and arise from the bed and Mapes begun to travel down making an inverse voyage while her fingers begun a movement in a continuum that maintained Jessica’s hips in a frenzy activity.

When Mapes lips arise to Jessica’s bellybutton she left a trace of saliva until her already soaked clit, then she raised again her hips until Mapes tongue parted her engorged outer lips and molded to her dripping labia.

Mapes grabbed her ass cheeks up, pulled her closer, and penetrated her with the tongue. Jessica cried out, her hips began to rock back and forth, in a mad cadenza, dragging her sex over Mapes lips and covering them with her lubrication, her pussy walls pulsing around Mapes tongue, drowning her with cream. Then the fremen women moved her lips and tongue to Jessica’s clit, first sucking then licking it without mercy.

Sometimes Jessica closed her eyes. Others she looked down to see Mapes face buried on her sex, her nose smashed against her triangle of pubic hair, both hands cupping and massaging her lover’s breasts.

The rhythm raised in a crescendo. Jessica sprawled her legs across the sheets, with her hair disheveled, covered in sweat, groaning, her right leg over Mapes’ shoulder with a growing desire of release.

The release came for the first time. But Mapes just eased a bit her effort, to allow Jessica’s recovery and then proceeded.

Jessica lost track of time, she let her imagination fly away. At some point it was a younger Gaius Helen Mohiam that was licking her and raising her again to another orgasm. Then her face vanished and Jessica saw a even younger sister that one night had climbed to Jessica’s cot. She couldn’t recall her name. What was her name? It didn’t matter because her toughs flied away, and it was Leto that kissed her inner tights. But she didn’t feel is hard beard chin. It couldn’t be Leto. She opened her eyes when she reached again her peak and recalled the moment that Paul tried to lick her in the swimming pool. She gasped. She moaned… and she pulled Mapes up to kiss her mouth and to lick her creamy lips…

Jessica needed to rest.

***

The Duke found Thufir Hawat alone in the corner room to which a guard directed him.

There was the sound of men setting up communications equipment in an adjoining room, but this place was fairly quiet. The Duke glanced around as Hawat arose from a paper-cluttered table. It was a green-walled enclosure with, in addition to the table, three suspensor chairs from which the Harkonnen "H" had been hastily removed, leaving an imperfect color patch.

"The chairs are liberated but quite safe," Hawat said. "Where is Paul, Sire?"

"I left him in the conference room. I’m hoping he’ll get some rest without me there to distract him."

Hawat nodded, crossed to the door to the adjoining room, closed it, shutting off the noise of static and electronic sparking.

"Thufir," Leto said, "the Imperial and Harkonnen stockpiles of spice attract my attention."

"M’Lord?"

The Duke pursed his lips. "Storehouses are susceptible to destruction." He raised a hand as Hawat started to speak. "Ignore the Emperor’s hoard. He’d secretly enjoy it if the Harkonnens were embarrassed. And can the Baron object if something is destroyed which he cannot openly admit that he has?"

Hawat shook his head. "We’ve few men to spare. Sire."

"Use some of Idaho’s men. And perhaps some of the Fremen would enjoy a trip off planet. A raid on Giedi Prime–there are tactical advantages to such a diversion, Thufir."

"As you say, my Lord." Hawat turned away, and the Duke saw evidence of nervousness in the old man, thought: Perhaps he suspects I distrust him. He must know I’ve private reports of traitors. Well–best quiet his fears immediately.

"Thufir," he said, "since you’re one of the few I can trust completely, there’s another matter bears discussion. We both know how constant a watch we must keep to prevent traitors from infiltrating our forces... but I have two new reports."

Hawat turned, stared at him.

And Leto repeated the stories Paul had brought.

Instead of bringing on the intense Mentat concentration, the reports only increased Hawat’s agitation.

Leto studied the old man and, presently, said: "You’ve been holding something back, old friend. I should’ve suspected when you were so nervous during Staff. What is it that was too hot to dump in front of the full conference?"

Hawat’s sapho-stained lips were pulled into a prim, straight line with tiny wrinkles radiating into them. They maintained their wrinkled stiffness as he said: "My Lord, I don’t quite know how to broach this."

"We’ve suffered many a scar for each other, Thufir," the Duke said. "You know you can broach any subject with me."

Hawat continued to stare at him, thinking: This is how I like him best. This is the man of honor who deserves every bit of my loyalty and service. Why must I hurt him?

"Well?" Leto demanded.

Hawat shrugged. "It’s a scrap of a note. We took it from a Harkonnen courier. The note was intended for an agent named Pardee. We’ve good reason to believe Pardee was top man in the Harkonnen underground here. The note – it’s a thing that could have great consequence or no consequence. It’s susceptible to various interpretations."

"What’s the delicate content of this note?"

"Scrap of a note, my Lord. Incomplete. It was on minimic film with the usual destruction capsule attached. We stopped the acid action just short of full erasure, leaving only a fragment. The fragment, however, is extremely suggestive."

"Yes?"

Hawat rubbed at his lips. "It says: ’... eto will never suspect, and when the blow falls on him from a beloved hand, its source alone should be enough to destroy him.’ The note was under the Baron’s own seal and I’ve authenticated the seal."

"Your suspicion is obvious," the Duke said and his voice was suddenly cold.

"I’d sooner cut off my arms than hurt you," Hawat said. "My Lord, what if..."

"The Lady Jessica," Leto said, and he felt anger consuming him. "Couldn’t you wring the facts out of this Pardee?"

"Unfortunately, Pardee no longer was among the living when we intercepted the courier. The courier, I’m certain, did not know what he carried."

"I see."

Leto shook his head, thinking: What a slimy piece of business. There can’t be anything in it. I know my woman.

"My Lord, if –"

"No!" the Duke barked. "There’s a mistake here that –"

"We cannot ignore it, my Lord."

"She’s been with me for sixteen years! There’ve been countless opportunities for – You yourself investigated the school and the woman!"

Hawat spoke bitterly: "Things have been known to escape me."

"It’s impossible, I tell you! The Harkonnens want to destroy the Atreides line – meaning Paul, too. They’ve already tried once. Could a woman conspire against her own son?"

"Perhaps she doesn’t conspire against her son. And yesterday’s attempt could’ve been a clever sham."

"It couldn’t have been a sham."

"Sire, she isn’t supposed to know her parentage, but what if she does know? What if she were an orphan, say, orphaned by an Atreides?"

"She’d have moved long before now. Poison in my drink... a stiletto at night. Who has had better opportunity?"

"The Harkonnens mean to destroy you, my Lord. Their intent is not just to kill. There’s a range of fine distinctions in kanly. This could be a work of art among vendettas."

The Duke’s shoulders slumped. He closed his eyes, looking old and tired. It cannot be, he thought. The woman has opened her heart to me.

"What better way to destroy me than to sow suspicion of the woman I love?" he asked.

"An interpretation I’ve considered," Hawat said. "Still..."

The Duke opened his eyes, stared at Hawat, thinking: Let him be suspicious. Suspicion is his trade, not mine. Perhaps if I appear to believe this, that will make another man careless.

"What do you suggest?" the Duke whispered.

"For now, constant surveillance, my Lord. She should be watched at all times. I will see it’s done unobtrusively. Idaho would be the ideal choice for the job. Perhaps in a week or so we can bring him back. There’s a young man we’ve been training in Idaho’s troop who might be ideal to send to the Fremen as a replacement. He’s gifted in diplomacy."

"Don’t jeopardize our foothold with the Fremen."

"Of course not, Sire."

"And what about Paul?"

"Perhaps we could alert Dr. Yueh."

Leto turned his back on Hawat. "I leave it in your hands."

"I shall use discretion, my Lord."

At least I can count on that, Leto thought. And he said: "I will take a walk. If you need me, I’ll be within the perimeter. The guard can –"

"My Lord, before you go, I’ve a filmclip you should read. It’s a first- approximation analysis on the Fremen religion. You’ll recall you asked me to report on it."

The Duke paused, spoke without turning. "Will it not wait?"

"Of course, my Lord. You asked what they were shouting, though. It was ’Mahdi!’ They directed the term at the young master. When they –"

"At Paul?"

"Yes, my Lord. They’ve a legend here, a prophecy, that a leader will come to them, child of a Bene Gesserit, to lead them to true freedom. It follows the familiar messiah pattern."

"They think Paul is this... this..."

"They only hope, my Lord." Hawat extended a filmclip capsule.

The Duke accepted it, thrust it into a pocket. "I’ll look at it later."

"Certainly, my Lord."

"Right now, I need time to... think."

"Yes, my Lord."

The Duke took a deep sighing breath, strode out the door. He turned to his right down the hall, began walking, hands behind his back, paying little attention to where he was. There were corridors and stairs and balconies and halls... people who saluted and stood aside for him.

In time he came back to the conference room, found it dark and Paul asleep on the table with a guard’s robe thrown over him and a ditty pack for a pillow. The Duke walked softly down the length of the room and onto the balcony overlooking the landing field. A guard at the corner of the balcony, recognizing the Duke by the dim reflection of lights from the field, snapped to attention.

"At ease," the Duke murmured. He leaned against the cold metal of the balcony rail.

A predawn hush had come over the desert basin. He looked up. Straight overhead, the stars were a sequin shawl flung over blue-black. Low on the southern horizon, the night’s second moon peered through a thin dust haze–an unbelieving moon that looked at him with a cynical light.

As the Duke watched, the moon dipped beneath the Shield Wall cliffs, frosting them, and in the sudden intensity of darkness, he experienced a chill. He shivered.

Anger shot through him.

The Harkonnens have hindered and hounded and hunted me for the last time, he thought.

They are dung heaps with village provost minds! Here I make my stand! And he thought with a touch of sadness: I must rule with eye and claw–as the hawk among lesser birds. Unconsciously, his hand brushed the hawk emblem on his tunic.

To the east, the night grew a faggot of luminous gray, then seashell opalescence that dimmed the stars.

There came the long, bell-tolling movement of dawn striking across a broken horizon. It was a scene of such beauty it caught all his attention.

Some things beggar likeness, he thought.

He had never imagined anything here could be as beautiful as that shattered red horizon and the purple and ochre cliffs. Beyond the landing field where the night’s faint dew had touched life into the hurried seeds of Arrakis, he saw great puddles of red blooms and, running through them, an articulate tread of violet... like giant footsteps.

"It’s a beautiful morning. Sire," the guard said.

"Yes, it is."

The Duke nodded, thinking: Perhaps this planet could grow on one. Perhaps it could become a good home for my son.

Then he saw the human figures moving into the flower fields, sweeping them with strange scythe-like devices–dew gatherers. Water so precious, here that even the dew must be collected.

And it could be a hideous place, the Duke thought.


End file.
